The Middle East

After the ceasefire

An old dawn

IN THE first light of the first day of the ceasefire, Gazans filed to mourning ceremonies postponed because of the bombing. In the garden outside the bedroom of Faris Bassioun, aged nine, killed in his sleep by the shrapnel of three Israeli missiles that ploughed into the neighbouring orchard, olive trees are charred and twisted. Lemons lie on the ground, roasted and black from the blast.

"Don't give us a six-year ceasefire, give us a hundred," cries Hanan Shabat, the mother of three children who are now in hospital in Beit Hanoun, in north-east Gaza, after shrapnel smashed into their bedroom. "What's the point of raising my child only to be killed when he's 11?" she says, crouched on a sofa littered with glass shards.

The clean-up has already begun. Worshippers hoover the thick cream carpets of the Istiqama mosque, whose walls were toppled by the blast. And Hamas guards are already back at their posts, entering the passport details of those coming in and out into their computers. "We have won the freedom to move," said one. "That is our victory."

Hamas cadres have particular reason to celebrate. For over six years, Israel, the region and western powers, led by the United States, have tried to bypass the movement that won the 2006 elections. Unlike the ceasefire that ended Israel's 2009 offensive, its terms include an end to Israeli incursions and the restoration of civilian life in what Israel calls its buffer zone. Hillary Clinton promised to help Gaza, without insisting that the aid go through the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah. No one mentioned the conditions laid down by the quartet of America, Russia, the European Union and the UN for dealing with Hamas.

Israel demonstrated its military superiority once again. But over the course of the campaign, Israeli negotiators discovered that the military asymmetry was matched by a contrary political mismatch, resulting from the region's new political landscape. So angered was Egypt, say Arab officials, by the killing of Ahmed Jabari—after Israel lowered his guard by expressing interest in a formal truce—that for the first two days Egyptian officials refused to pick up the phone when their Israeli counterparts called. A few days in, Israel had still failed to penetrate the upper echelons of Egypt's politicians, relying instead on its intelligence contacts. "Morsi [Egypt's president] was talking directly to Meshal [Hamas's leader], but he wouldn't speak to a single Israeli," said a former adviser to Israel's Defence Minister, Ehud Barak. "Hamas lost the military battle but won the political war."

The agreement lays out the principles for a restoration of normality, not a timetable to achieve it. Israelis who helped negotiate the agreement expect their government to take only minor steps to open border crossings before the Israeli elections in January. How to prevent Hamas from rearming with smuggled weapons is still to be determined, they say.

But if the Palestinian factions stop shooting both in Gaza and from Sinai, says a government spokesman, the movement of Gaza's students back to their West Bank universities, the reunification of families split by Israel's definition of Gaza as "a hostile entity" could be "expeditable". Mr Barak has committed to halting incursions into the 300-metre buffer zone that Israel had declared inside Gaza, allowing farmers to return to their fields. Hamas, meanwhile, will open its southern gateway through Rafah and formalise its trade relations with Egypt.

Correction: This post originally referred to Hanan Shabat as "Hanan Shabak". This has now been corrected. Sorry.

There will not be peace until the underlying problems are at least recognized, the West included:

1. Anti-semitism is primarily a Christian phenomenon. It has been the Jews' great misfortune that Jesus was a Jew and that his death was, at least, encouraged by some of the Jewish elite of that time.
2. Jews had cohabited with Moslems, including communities within Jerusalem and neighboring towns, for over a thousand years, experiencing no more discrimination than most other minorities. (Most of the surviving Jews evicted from Christian Spain went South into Moslem territory rather than North into Christendom, for example.)2. Zionism arose as a reaction to increasing anti-Semitism in Europe. But it would probably not have led to more than some internationally guaranteed rights within an independent, multi-ethnic nation which would probably have included Jordan.
3. The Holocaust changed all that. European and American Jews realized they had to have a state of their own, not as a matter of pride but as being essential to Jewish survival.
4. Once the West acknowledged what had happened, they supported the Zionist cause, mostly out of a sense of guilt.
5. The influx of Zionists into the Palestinian territories inevitably caused a reaction among the resident communities and some reacted more strongly than others. Whether these tensions and reactions were significantly worse than those in Europe resulting from the more recent immigration of Moslems is open to debate, even though the Zionist program was in many respects an existential threat to their society. (They were fully aware of the Balfour Declaration and the way it was interpreted by the Zionist immigrants.)
6. Morale within the Muslim (and Christian) communities was low. After centuries of Turkish rule, the Western communities had, through Britain, taken over control. At that time, the Europeans assumed a racial as well as cultural superiority over the "natives". They had no memory of being masters in their own house.
7. At the same time, educational standards were improving and Western political theories were coming into circulation. The most pernicious of these was Nationalism. Nationalism requires a myth of persecution coupled with a nostalgic dream of return to a better past. Arab Nationalism grew as a doctrine more or less in parallel with Zionism, and both placed a high value on the religious value of the land. The West had given validity to these ideas by the 1919 Treaty of Versailles which endorsed the idea of nation-states and of self-determination.
8. After WWII the Zionists understandably sought to find room for the surviving European Jews. And the Arabs, equally understandable, saw no reason to make room for them. They had had no part in the Holocaust - why should troubles on another continent and in a different culture make them suffer? Tensions mounted on both sides.
9. Both sides resorted to terrorism against each other and against their British governors.
10. In good faith, the United Nations tried to square the cycle by partitioning Palestine. The Arab states in the area reacted by declaring war on what they saw as intruders and lost. Israeli forces used the opportunity to ethnically cleanse areas they had captured. And the Arabs refused to accept the resulting injustice. They still do.
11. Succeeding wars and occupations have simply hardened attitudes on both sides. But two to three generations have grown up since 1948 and the perpetrators of the original injustices on all sides (Zionists, Arabs and the Western communities) are nearly all dead. It is time to move on.

Both sides acted in what they saw as the best interests of their communities and in accordance with principles that were commonly accepted at the time. But those interests and principles were, and are, incompatible. The question is not how to establish a truce which can only prolong both the injustice to the Arabs and the existential threat to Israel, but how to find a compromise that at least partially satisfies both sides. This can only be achieved by each side recognizing, and empathizing with, the the real needs of the other. Simply establishing a Palestinian state will not suffice unless it can be economically viable, and then be allowed to grow and prosper.

In any Palestinian-Israeli conflict Israel is always going to "win" militarily (she has to win - the alternative is annihilation), and "lose" politically. It is a sad fact that Israel will always face political opprobrium from the usual quarters - The Muslim majority in the UN and a largely biased press - and here, sadly, I have to include Pomegranate.
The Israeli-Palestinian narrative has always been influenced by the unyielding Muslim opposition to the creation of a non-Muslim (i.e. Jewish) sovereign state on real-estate that the Muslim world considers part of the Muslim "ummah". That opposition has manifested itself in many forms; the creation of Palestinian refugees in the aftermath of the 1948 War of Independence - referred to by the Arabs as "Nakba", and arising from that the "Right of Return" canard. In other words, 3 generations of Arab refugees (they only became "Palestinian" once Yasser Arafat formed the Palestine Liberation Organisation - hence PLO in the 1960's) became pawns in the game of Muslim rejectionism against a sovereign Jewish state. Witness the old canard; "the Occupation". That word all by itself embodies all that the Muslim world wishes to convey as their opposition to a Jewish state. Absent that implacable opposition, the Palestinians would have long ago had their own state.
That opposition is clearly demonstrated in a recent interview of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh by Christiane Amanpour. When questioned by Ms Amanpour, the Hamas leader obfuscated and avoided answering Ms Amanpour's questions.
Regrettably, the Palestinians' suffering will continue for as long as Muslim rejectionism continues. I wish I was wrong, but this conflict will not be the last, I fear.

What is clear is that Israel is hated more than before; and thanks to its demonic Narcissistic demagogue, Netanyahu, it has become even more of a pariah state. The repercussions will continue to spread . . . to the detriment of Israelis and Jews worldwide.

What if it had been the other way around? What if Gaza had been a Jewish ghetto (perhaps the last remnant of the State of Israel), surrounded and bockaded by a hostile Palestinian state whose vast military and economic superiority included nuclear weapons. What is the most recent bombing of the ghetto had included the death of 25 Jewish children? What would the reaction be?

it looks like the Economist has lost any ability to produce a balanced article about the israeli - plestinian conflict. no word about the hamas trigerring this colision. no word about one thousand (!!) rockets shot to israeli cities, including Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, in one purpose - killing as many civilians as possible. all the Economist has to present is a photo of the ruins in Gaza and the stories of children injured in Gaza. for the Economist Israeli victims are not counted. anybody who arrives from a different planet and is not familiar with the facts would assume, after reading your article, that the palestinians are peace seeking people who are subject to israeli attacks, which is against all obvious facts. your bias and prejudice against israel is discusting.

A. Israel should stop all hostilities in the Gaza Strip land, sea and air including incursions and targeting of individuals.

B. All Palestinian factions shall stop all hostilities from the Gaza Strip against Israel including rocket attacks and all attacks along the border.

C. Opening the crossings and facilitating the movements of people and transfer of goods and refraining from restricting residents' free movements and targeting residents in border areas and procedures of implementation shall be dealt with after 24 hours from the start of the ceasefire.

D. Other matters as may be requested shall be addressed."

You can read into that whatever you want but none of the stuff mentioned in the post is actually in there. It doesn't say Israel will stop all future hits on individuals. It doesn't say they'll leave the so-called buffer zone alone. If there are rocket attacks, then expect Israel will respond as before. If people attack the border fence, then Israel will respond. And so on. Again, maybe if you're in Gaza and you're listening to people who proclaim victory no matter what happens, then you read things the way they want. But it isn't that way.

Do you really think "refraining from restricting residents' free movements" means anything other than not shooting at people now? Or that "targeting residents in borders areas" means anything other than not now? This is a ceasefire. That you apparently buy into the Hamas spin is kind of sad.

One of the biggest problems in this region is the inability to grapple with reality. You quote this: "We have won the freedom to move," said one. "That is our victory." Really? You have the exact same ability to enter from Rafah as before. Nothing more. But if you insist that getting nothing is victory then you create the circumstances for another future loss of life where you declare victory and gain nothing.

" The "great" Egyptian president decided to become a dictator 'a la Mubarak' earlier today."

Look, Mubarak was a rather unsavory character, without a doubt, but there really is no need to denigrate him any further by comparing Morsi to him. Mubarak never had the powers Morsi had just arrogated to himself. A little (minutes, really) research will confirm this. It seems that the old saying "the kind is dead, long live the king" in Egypt is "the pharaoh is dead, long live the pharaoh". Except, by all indication, this new pharaoh promises to be a far nastier one than the one he replaced. Well, people have to be careful what they wish for, don't they?...

Look, all this anti-Israel / anti-Semitic HATRED gets very tiresome.
Israel cleared out of Gaza -- lock, stock and barrel -- and yet there's no peace. The Arabs continue to send deadly rockets into Israel; then, when the Jewish state retaliates, the prejudiced world blames Israel. We live on a STUPID planet! The only criticism anyone can make against Israel is their unlawful building of Settlements illegally on Palestinian land in the West Bank. However, the Arabs refuse categorically to make peace with Israel, so there we are -- it's all a Catch-22 with absolutely NO SOLUTION. Planet Earth, land of the MORONS!

The Israelis and Palestinians live in proximity and hostility. That gives no sign of changing. Numbers published in European press this week showed that some 1500 rockets have been fired at Israel from Gaza this year. Over 11 months, that's almost 5 a day--every day. When a militarily weaker side attacks an admittedly stronger one, the result is predictable. Hamas could clearly stop the rockets if they were of a mind to. That they do not suggests they see some advantage from this situation. Hard to fathom.

The ceasefire between Gaza and Israel is a need of the time. Gazans need "ceasefire not for six years but for hundred years" People want peace, no war /no conflict. Why Hamas has been fighting ignoring the feelings of the people.The terrorists are confronting for their own political interests.The ceasefire is just an interval for the Hamas. People want peace,prosperity and good healthcare.Gazans should understand the need of education for the students. If we refer the "Bible" Arabs and Israelis are the cousin brothers,sons of a father Abraham.

Most of the comments are 'right on the money'. And this includes The Economist bias. But the reality is not that complicated: there will never be peace as long as there are Arabs (nic "Palestinians") living in Cisjordan.

The West is so dependent on Arab oil that it is ready, especially Europe, to sacrifice Israel and its inhabitants if this would guarantee an uninterrupted flow of oil at a reasonable price. Israel, on the other hand, is not prepared to commit suicide just to please the Western nations.

The only way out of this impasse is to get rid of Hamas and Fatah by repatriating all "Palestinians" to their ancestors' lands (mainly Saudi Arabia). This will give the "Palestinians" an opportunity to prove that they are able to support themselves through their work rather than the charity provided mostly by European nations and the U.S.

This truce will probably last about 30/60 days after which … it will be back to 'business as usual' for the terrorists and their Muslim allies (now including Turkey). Quite frankly, truce between the Israelis and the "Palestinians" is NO news; peace, honest peace, would be.

It would appear that your personal wishes are not universally shared - the much you wished they were...http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/138435/barak-mendelsohn/hamas-mis...
P.S. What happened? You are not self-advertising your blog- as you're wont to do every chance you had in the past. Your self-promotion ought to include your prejudices and other thinly-disguised racial and political hatreds of yours, too, you know. Or, that might not be good for your self-propagated image? But your concern for Israelis, and Jews worldwide, is rather touching, it must be admitted...

And I note the danger in reading into documents what isn't there has already been proved. From the NYT:

"Maan, the Palestinian news agency, reported that a group of Palestinians went to Abassan, a border area east of the southern town of Khan Younis, on Friday to pray on their land, and ended up throwing stones at soldiers, who responded with gunfire. Ashraf al-Qedra, a spokesman for the Health Ministry, identified the man who was killed as Ahmad Qudaih."

Since details of this kind of thing tend to be highly inaccurate, here's another take from the Israeli press:

"A relative of the dead man, who was at the scene, told Reuters that Qdeih had been trying to place a Hamas flag on the fence. He added that an Israeli soldier had fired into the air three times before Qdeih was hit in the head by a bullet."

So if Hamas is selling the idea that they've "won" something about the border fence, they're lying and that is going to hurt people.

BTW, the US is as violent on its border with Mexico. We've killed 3 people in Mexico by shooting at them in the past 2 years, including a teenager killed in October for throwing stones. We aren't at war with Mexico.

As someone whose home is Ireland the Irael-Palestinian conflict is horribly familiar. Remember the 'troubles' in Northern Ireland were at their height for around 30 years but this was only the peak of somewhat lower level injustice which had been in existence for 400 years or so largely as a consequence of Britain's insecurity with respect to Spain and France and the possibility of invasion through Catholic Ireland. For all that time terrible social and military injustices were perpetrated on one side, and murder and mayhem on the other. Into the 1990s it seemed that this would go on in perpetuity. However, due to the great courage and imagination of senior politicians both sides of the border and of course President Bill Clinton, and members of the IRA, talks took place without reporting by the media until it was possible to bring the process into the open and eventually the peace process was born. Even when acts took place which could have brought a break down the politicians and paramilitaries now committed to te peace process held the line. There are still a few madmen who are trying to continue the 'armed struggle' but the population prefers peace.
It seems to me that what is lacking in the Israel/palesinian situation is that politicians of courage and imagination are missing, people who are prepared to find a way of communicating with 'the enemy' away from the public eye for as long as it takes to find a common language which can lead to peace. Along with that of course it is necessary to begin to lay the foundation for getting the populations on either side to accept the peace plan once it has been worked out. The critical point is that the talks must continue whatever atrocities are committed by either side and all being well aware,that when the talks become public knowledge there will be an upsurge of violence to try and disrupt the process.
Of course the Israel'Palestinian situation has been made hugely more difficult by the settlement policy which has been consistently condemmed by the UN and the international community and addressing this will be a major part of any talks but THERE WILL BE NO PEACE UNTIL TALKS TAKE PLACE AND CONTINUE UNTIL AGREEMENT. The extremists on both sides are no worse I am sure than the extremists we had in Ireland who now work side by side in Parliament.

You are not right stating that Israeli victims are not counted by the Economist. They count Israeli victims alright, but find the count too low for their liking. For the Economist scribblers the most negative side of the conflict is that the Jews refuse to die meekly.

Actually your story is a bit off. By the beginning of fighting Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of the Arab League, was speaking on the radio: "This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre" Even before the fighting began, 30000 mainly well-to-do Arabs had left Palestine temporarily, expecting to return in triumph. With no administration to protect them many poor Arabs fled too. When Jews captured Haifa, 20000 Arabs had gone and most of remaining 50000 left afterwards despite Jewish pleas to remain.

Colonel Richard Kemp from Britain said he was impressed with the accuracy of Israeli intelligence in targeting senior Hamas terrorists during the operation, and noted that out of 177 Gazans killed during the operation, some 120 were terrorists.

“Every civilian casualty is a great tragedy, but unfortunately when you’re fighting an enemy like Hamas which uses the civilian population to shield itself, this is an unfortunate outcome and the only other choice is to allow them to carry on hammering the rockets into Israel,” he said.

Kemp, a former commander of the UK forces in Afghanistan, said the targeted killings of Hamas terrorists were important, explaining that similar actions by the U.S. and the UK against Al-Qaeda terrorists have significantly damaged its abilities to hit Western targets.

“I think that the targeted killing of Hamas’s leadership has done untold damage to Hamas,” he said. “Hamas talks big now, it’s talking victory, but actually it’s been very severely damaged: both their leadership and also their munitions.”